The Hindu : Other States / Orissa News : Over 20 lakh children to be covered under mop-up pulse polio drive

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Thursday, Apr 10, 2008
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Over 20 lakh children to be covered under mop-up pulse polio drive

Staff Reporter

The programme will be taken up in 12 districts from April 13 to 15

8,393 centres to be set up to administer vaccines
Surveillance officers of WHO will be in-charge of districts

BHUBANESWAR: In one of the largest anti-polio drives, 20,74,425 children would be administered vaccines across 109 blocks spreading over 12 districts of Orissa from April 13. This will be part of State government’s mop-up pulse polio drive, which will be taken up from April 13 to 15.

According to State Health Department, the anti-polio drive would be conducted at 8,393 centres.

To ensure success of the drive, 33,528 workers and 1,665 supervisors will be present in different centres.

Five surveillance officers working under World Health Organisation (WHO) based in Chhatisgarh and Jharkhand and three in Orissa would be in-charge of a district. Senior officers of Health and Family Welfare department would manage the programme.

While children below five years of age would be administered anti-polio drops at designated centres on April 13, during next two days workers would go round the houses to administer drops to left out children. The mop-up programme has been designed following detection of polio-infection child in Bhubaneswar during February last.

Institutional delivery

Meanwhile, National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) has announced that institutional delivery rate has improved in the State. During last two years, institutional delivery rate has gone up from 34 per cent to 61 per cent, which has also helped the cause of safe motherhood.

To strengthen the programme, it was aimed to identify 140 health centres as First Stage Referral Units (FRUs) by 2012, NRHM State Director Sushil Kumar Lohani said in a statement here.

As many as 32 district level hospitals, 22 sub-divisional dispensaries and 77 community health centres will be identified as FRUs, he said. In the each proposed FRU, five specialist doctors and operational conservation and maintenance personnel will be appointed. Besides, a child corner would be set up to provide 24 hours advisory services. Twenty-three doctors, who would apply anaesthesia, have already undergone short-term training programmes and three staff nurses would also be sent to those hospitals.

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